Finding Biographical Information: Getting Started

The first step when searching for information about a person is to decide how much information you want. This will have a major effect on where you look, because there are sources with brief factual information all the way up to full-length books with deep analysis.

If you need a full-length biography, read the section in the box to the right. 

The sources listed on the following pages have briefer information, anywhere from a paragraph to several pages. 

If you want an entire book about a person, you may want to checkout a book at the library. Public libraries usually have separate sections for biographies, but college libraries mix them in with the other books on a topic. For example, biographies of musicians will be in the music section.

• If you already know the title of a specific biography, search the library by selecting Title from the dropdown menu in the library search tool and type the title of the book in the search bar.   

• If you are looking for a biography of a specific person, select General Subjects from the dropdown menu in the library search tool and  type the person's last name and then first name in the search bar.
• If you want biographies of people in a specific discipline, use the Keywords section and type in the discipline and the word "biography," for example: mathematicians and biography.